Coming Soon: Marijuana Legalization

This November California voters will have the opportunity to vote for a ballot measure that would legalize marijuana for personal use. Californians would be able to cultivate gardens of up to 25 square feet, and possess up to an ounce for their own use.

Not everybody is happy about this. In addition to the “war on drugs” types, this article says California pot growers are unhappy, because they believe legalization would lower prices and cut into the profits they now reap from selling illegally. They are surely right about that.

My conjecture is that marijuana will be legal throughout the United States within a decade, not for the benefit of pot heads, but because the government will want the revenue from taxing it. We’ve been fighting a war on drugs for 30 years, apparently without success. As the federal government continues to hemorrhage red ink, partly to pay for health care “reform” that will surely cost more than currently projected, it will seem increasingly pragmatic to legalize drugs and tax them.

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